Word of Life Church Podcast

Original blessing is more original than original sin. Jesus is the new Adam who leads humanity back to original blessing. The community of the baptized belong to the new humanity to which God says, "You are my beloved sons and daughters, with you I am well pleased."

"Magi from the east came to Jerusalem saying, 'Where is he...?" -Matthew 2:2 Two thousand years ago magi from Persia came to Jerusalem seeking the one born King of the Jews and asking, "Where is he?" What about modern magi? What about 21st century seekers? What about those who in some way believe Jesus is important, but don't quite know where to find him. If asked by modern magi, "Where is he? Whe...

One of the most unique things about the religion of the ancient Hebrews was the prohibition against making images of the Divine. The two things all ancient religions had in common were sacrifice and images. Israel shared sacrificial rites similar with other religions, but they prohibited the creation of sacred images. Israel had a correct instinct that to make an image of God is to misrepresent Go...

Losing Jesus. Finding Jesus. Rethinking Jesus. This is how we make spiritual progress. This is the only way we make spiritual progress! We think we’ve got Jesus figured out. We think we know the crowd where Jesus can be found. We think we know where we can always locate Jesus. Then one day…he’s not there! And we have to go searching for him. “Seek and you shall find.” But when we find Jesus after...

Jesus came into the world at the intersection of beauty and pain. Christ was born on the fault line of our most intractable conflict. O little town of Bethlehem… A city today where the beauty of Orthodox icons and olive wood Nativity sets collides head on with the brutality of teargas canisters and rubber bullets. Hope and horror in the House of Bread.

As Christians we will either be a people of joy and peace or else will belong to the crowd of fear and rage that is so vocal in our day. In an age of fear and rage we are called to be a people marked by joy and peace. One of the scandalous things about the early Christians to the Roman mind was their apparently absurd joy. Despite the fact that the early Christians were often persecuted, they were...

Advent is the season where we prepare for the birth of Christ. We don’t just prepare to celebrate the birth of Christ (decorate, shop, bake, etc), but we actually prepare for Christ to born into our lives in a new way. Thus Advent is the season where we do work to keep Christ in Christians.

We are presently in a time of great darkness. The darkness of hate, bigotry, violence, and vengeance threatens to sweep over the world. But in this darkness a light shines -- the light of Jesus. Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, prophesied about Messiah, saying that he would, "give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death to guide us to the path of peace."

When I was in Bethlehem the week before Advent I was given two beautiful icons. I was also given two other "souvenirs"—a spent tear gas canister and a used rubber bullet. Jesus was born in Bethlehem—at the intersection of beauty and pain, on the fault line of our most intractable conflicts. This is where salvation comes into the world. O little town of Bethlehem—where the beauty of Orthodox icons...

The season of Advent is about anticipation, preparation, and longing. Anticipation because something has been promised by God. Preparation because we must prepare the way to participate in the promise. Longing because what has been promised matters—the salvation of the world. During Advent we practice the Christian virtue of patience as we learn to wait on God. Jeremiah 33:14–16 is one of the grea...

As followers of Jesus we are called not to avenge ourselves, but to "leave it to the wrath of God," because vengeance belongs to God; God will repay. We know God's vengeance is not an eye-for-an-eye justice, so what can it mean? The wrath of God, often connected to God's vengeance, is a metaphor pointing us to God's judgment. What we call the "wrath of God" is what evil looks like in the light of...

The Christian mind is the mind of Christ where we are enabled by the Spirit to think as people in Christ. The danger of not developing a Christian mind is the potential to be cut off from the life of God. We have the mind of Christ and we have the ability to work with the Spirit in cultivating a Christian mind that is humble, renewed, active, and maturing.

Since Cain Killed Abel the human family has been longing for justice. Following in Israel's legacy of longing, Isaiah paints a picture of the plans and purposes of God to save. He reminds the people of God to tarry. In the midst of suffering, when the light of the future seems to flicker and fade Isaiah beckons the people of God to keep waiting. For there is one coming that will set all things rig...

Hope has been the theme of the people of God since the beginning. Hope is essential to carry on. In those times that everything seems lost we hold to hope. We hope that what has been lost can be found, what has been broken can be mended, and what has been destroyed can be rebuilt. Does what we hope in matter? And what happens if our hope becomes misguided? Will God's faithfulness to save, heal, an...

There are monsters in this world, but the God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is not one of them. Yes, there are monsters. We have an imagination for monsters because we know of their existence. Venomous and vicious beasts were a daily peril for our earliest ancestors. Volcanoes and tsunamis can swallow whole cities. Hurricanes and tornados roar from the heavens, leaving hell in their wake. Ep...

In forty years of following Jesus these are my four most significant discoveries: 1. Jesus Is the Light of the World 2. The Christian Life is a Journey 3. The Kingdom of God is Everything 4. God Is Like Jesus

Paul writes to the deeply flawed church at Corinth and calls them saints—which is theologically correct, but also, if you know about those Corinthian Christians, a bit hilarious. We are called saints in Christ. Which is a lovely thing to call sinners trying to follow Jesus. We are saints—holy ones. But we’re also sinners…and we live in that tension. Those of us following Jesus are pilgrims trying...

In Mark chapter ten we find two stories back to back that exemplify how we should and should not pray. In the first story James and John approach Jesus saying, "We want you to do for us whatever we ask." This self-agenda based prayer is met with rebuff from Jesus. In the second story the blind beggar Bartimaues simply prayers, "Lord, have mercy on me." Jesus responds to this humble, open-ended ple...

If there’s a secret to making progress as a Christian pilgrim, it’s this: When following Jesus gets hard and discouraging and confusing—and it will!—just don’t quit, but keep on pressing on.

The modern adage goes, "I'm not religious, but I'm spiritual." But what does that mean and where does it come from? The modern contempt for religion doesn't come from Jesus and the Apostles, it comes from the likes of Voltaire and Nietzsche. Jesus was religious. Throughout his life Jesus engaged in religious practices. Religion is essential to spiritual formation. If we hope to be formed as Christ...

The Christian life is a journey, a pilgrimage. It's not a static state of being, but a call to follow Jesus. The point of the journey is not so much where we're going, but what we're becoming. Jesus didn't say, "Follow me and I will take you..." Jesus said, "Follow me and I will make you..."

In the fifth century BC Ezra led Jerusalem in a revival of fidelity to the Torah by exhorting those who had married Samaritan women to divorce them and send them away along with their children. But what happens if we invite Jesus into the story? Things change. Jesus never used the word grace, but his whole life was an embodiment of grace. Jesus embodied the grace of God by always making room at th...

Zechariah is the prophet of the comeback. Israel had been on a long losing streak. A divided kingdom, a civil war, corrupt kings and priests, Israel conquered by Assyria, Judah conquered by Babylon, and worst of all, the Temple of God destroyed. It's under these bleak conditions that Zechariah dares to prophesy of a comeback for Israel. Not only will the Temple be rebuilt, but Israel's true king w...

God's people were living in exile in Babylon. The world around them had grown dark. No light. No temple. No Sabbath. No God. No hope. Into this dark cloud of despair comes a word from elsewhere from Isaiah of the Exile. He brings a word of comfort, a word of encouragement -- the God of Israel was coming to rescue and save. Isaiah poetic word of prophecy was filled with seven themes: 1. God is crea...

We live in a secular age with this consensus, the way things are is the way things will be. In this secular age, there is little room for dreaming. Dreams are seen as the practice of children, but what if we could learn to dream again? What new possibilities might open up before us as we embrace this sacred practice of the imagination. From the dreams of Isaiah to the visions of John the Revelator...